Oysterfest

You know you have good friends when for their joint birthdays they want to share their favorite getaway spot with you. And when that idyllic vacation town (St. Michael's, Maryland) also happens to be hosting an Oysterfest, it might be hard not to feel like it's everyone's birthday.

The crew! See if you can spot the only adult who forgot sunglasses...

...I mean who wanted to match the babies.

The weather was over-the-top perfect - sunny and crisp and so nice that I lost track of how many times we talked about it. We cruised the Chesapeake in a buy boat - the boats that would ferry between the fishing boats and shore to sell the oysters - and generally caused a scene for the other passengers:

I assume Davey's sounding a "barbaric yawp" here.

We saw boats being built, toured ships from the 1700s, ate lobster rolls, and saw the very cool screw-pile lighthouse. Of course, I failed to get any pictures of the festival, or even oysters themselves. But I was excited enough about all of the rope and net-making going on to take this one random picture: 

So there's that.

The town itself is so charming that I had a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that people actually lived there. It seems like the sort of place that would go into hibernation, and just come back to life at especially picturesque times, like Christmas and the summer solstice...and Oysterfest.

A bed and breakfast built in 1667.

Another sign of good friends is when their people are fun to be with - the group that went to St. Michael's has been our friend group for years now, but we have Davey and Jenna to thank for that originally.

Mollie has a rather unseemly crush on Jackson.

Being told not to eat the leaves is so unreasonable.

We finished off the day with a tour of a rum distillery, coffee by the bay, and a delicious outdoor dinner (everything that day was delicious - maybe in part because of how good things taste when you've spent the entire day out in fresh air).  

So, we're clearly under the town's spell now. I can't wait to go back. Thanks and happy birthdays, Talbots!